Carlos Kalmar creates a crowd-pleaser at Grant Park
The best way to revive a once-popular showpiece is to play it with utmost conviction. And that is what Carlos Kalmar, Conrad Tao and the Grant Park Orchestra did Friday...
All Stories
Review: Susanna Malkki, Branford Marsalis lead CSO in a program with pop
Of all the guest conductors who repeatedly have appeared before the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in recent years, Susanna Malkki has assembled the most engrossing programs. She came in 2011 with...
Dal Niente’s ‘Party 2017’ pushes music off-focus
Food and drink long have been used to lure potential listeners to concerts, and Saturday night Ensemble Dal Niente made use of them at "Party 2017," the group's season-closing program...
Review: Maurizio Pollini’s Chopin a modernist vision at Orchestra Hall
Maurizio Pollini came to wide attention in the music of Frederic Chopin nearly 60 years ago, and late in life he is revisiting scores of his defining success. His recital...
At MCA, unusual ‘Whisper(s)’ grows to 100 musicians
On Sunday afternoon the Museum of Contemporary Art ended its winter-spring performance season with "Whisper(s)," a highly unusual concert of mostly percussion works played by Matthew Duvall and a staggering...
Review: A quiet, 5-hour marathon scaled by Spektral Quartet at MCA
The Everest of modern string quartets received its Chicago premiere at the Museum of Contemporary Art on Saturday night, and Spektral Quartet gamely scaled it in a mere five hours...
St. Petersburg Philharmonic rocked Shostakovich
If any ensemble is justified in playing on tour Dmitri Shostakovich's overplayed Fifth Symphony, it is the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra. It gave the work its first performance in 1937,...
Lincoln Center players bring fire to Mendelssohn
Monday night's program by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance bore the title "Mendelssohn on Fire," which turned out to be...
Beethoven reconsidered by Ivan Fischer and the Budapest ensemble
Ivan Fischer and the Budapest Festival Orchestra like to do things differently. At the start of a five-city North American tour in New York this week, one of their ideas...
Cleveland Orchestra brings a refined Beethoven to Orchestra Hall
For at least half of its 99-year history, the Cleveland Orchestra was the most refined of North American symphonic ensembles. And, judging from Saturdaynight's concert at Orchestra Hall, it still...